BE WELL.

As I sat alone in the back room of a bar in the Mile End of Montréal on the eve of my 29th birthday, I flipped mindlessly through the big book I’d carried with me all day through the grey, snow’d city.

Around me, musical and magical women were setting up the space for a spoken word show, as I sipped Irish’d rooibos tea, tucked away in a dim corner.

I glanced back toward the book I had been holding open on the table as I watched the surrounding scene. That’s when these words seemed to reach off the page to touch me:

"We cannot save people, we can only Love them."

• Anaïs Nin

Struck right in the heart by her succinct insight, the walls I had so carefully constructed began to crumble inside of my chest. It was as if there was a piece of myself missing all this time that I didn’t even know was missing … until those words found their way back to the heart of me.

I didn’t have much time to process the entirety of Ms. Nin’s words before a blessing of beautiful lady-friends arrived to usher me into the blustery winter’s night for a midnight bull-riding birthday celebration.

Two seasons came and passed before I realized just how deeply that quote had affected me. As the year rolled on, I became increasingly engrossed with learning how to enhance my own Wellness everyday. I dove into the topic of this blog like a mad scientist, practicing Wellness on myself so that I’d have something to preach on the page.

My lifestyle, however, was not always so pro-Wellness.

For years I was stuck in the revolving doors of the rat race, working random jobs and massaging strangers’ muscles for money to pay for my meager lifestyle and student debts.

That is until that fateful Christmas Day when one swift motion of lifting my massage table sentenced me to a debilitating back injury, which left me self-unemployed and on my own to rehabilitate for years.

Without being able to work as a massage therapist, I stumbled through most of my 20’s not really knowing what to do to regain my ability to walk, sleep and earn a living, pain-free.

The long line-ups for inconclusive tests in sterile medical buildings, mixed with the endless prescription drugs, were enough to make me take a leap of faith and walk my own path back to Wellness.

My old, outmoded habit patterns had gotten me stuck in that mess of chronic pain, and I knew that I had to be the one to get myself out.

The journey of returning to life pain-free took a few frustrating years, and the regaining of strength and passion took a couple more, but I am happily living a life of Wellness now!

With generous help and support from family, friends and countless strangers, I managed to save myself.

In less than 5 years, I can boast a 99% recovered sciatic nerve injury, by simply learning to Be Well everyday, in all kinds of small ways.

As an offering of love to all the people that I cannot save, I can only hope that someday, something in these words will help you on your way.